That night still haunts me
by blu-eyed-demon
Summary: The remaining three brothers, the night of Jack's death, struggle to come to terms with the loss of their youngest.


The night Jack died, Jeremiah lay awake most of the night

Disclaimer: I don't own Four Brothers, the rights to the film/characters etc.

**That night still haunts me**

The night after Jack died, Jeremiah lay awake most of the night. He couldn't get the sight of Jack's blood out of his head. The crimson stains on the fresh white snowed haunted his vision constantly. From the ketchup on his daughters' dinners to the red of Camille's lipstick when she kissed him, everything brought him back to Jack's terrible death.

It wouldn't leave his mind. The way his brother's white t-shirt had soaked with blood, how the droplet had streaked slowly from the corner of the kid's mouth as he gasped and struggled to breathe whilst drowning in his own blood. The way every vein on Jack's skin was suddenly a clear as day to him while his heart worked overtime, trying to get enough blood around his body.

Jerry didn't think he'd ever get the sight of Jackie's life-force gushing out onto the street they'd grown up on out of his mind. It was etched into it forever.

The night after Jack died, Angel lay awake most of the night. He couldn't block the sound of Jackie's screams from his ears. He tried everything to block it out but neither the record player nor Bobby and Sofi fighting could force it out of his head. Every frustrated scream of his older brother's name from his girlfriend's lips turned into a terrified scream of his baby brother in his ears. Every time he so much as looked at Bobby, he heard the screams.

It made absolute sense to Angel, the second youngest, that Bobby had been the name on Jack's dying lips. Bobby was their big brother, Bobby was the strong one. Now Bobby can't stop crying and Angel's drowning, drowning in the screams that he just can't stop.

After sleep finally took him, he woke to his own bloodcurdling scream but to him it was not his own voice but Jack's screaming _"BOBBY!"_

The night after Jack died, Bobby didn't go to bed.

In the early evening he headed out to the corner, the corner of the street where Jack had died and washed the blood away. He couldn't let the neighbourhood kids see it, he knew Evelyn would have said as much and so he scrubbed, scrubbed the last evidence of Jack away. He sat scrubbing until long after night fell, convincing himself he could still see just a little bit more. When he finally realised he couldn't, he wept and clutched at the ground.

He was eventually dragged inside by Angel, who forced him to shower. But on his way to the bathroom he caught sight of a photo of Jack on stage with his band, tongue bar glistening from the stage lights.

That tongue bar. Bobby had ridiculed him too much about it, he knew that now. He'd made his baby brother ashamed of the bar that he'd been so proud of and that fact now made the eldest Mercer sick to his stomach.

The shower was rushed before he ran back down the stairs. Bobby spent the entire night in the kitchen searching for the bar that he knew Jack had removed before Thanksgiving dinner. It felt wrong that Jack was without it, he had to find it. For Jackie's sake.

The sun was almost risen when Sofi found Bobby, in the kitchen on his knees as he sobbed his heart out. He hadn't found the bar. He'd failed Jack, failed his Cracker-Jack; he'd failed to do this one little thing for him.

Sofi, for once, said nothing. She just coaxed him to stand and gently led him to bed by the hand, Jack's bed. From her eyes he knew she understood, knew that she would not mention this later. It was their secret.

Bobby lay for sometime, breathing the scent unique to Jack that clung to the sheets he'd wrapped himself in and just as sleep was taking him a glint caught his eye. The tongue bar lay in front next to a framed picture of himself directly opposite Jack's pillow.

And finally Robert Mercer could sleep, knowing that he would not have to bury his little brother without his beloved tongue bar.


End file.
